What My Viable Paradise Cohort is Doing!

Life has been decidedly nuts of late: long hours for my day job, lots to do on the house, and a wedding to plan! I have been taking a little break from writing while I try to cope with all of that. I’m hoping to resume in March, but in the meantime my Viable Paradise cohort has been writing some nifty things:

  • Lauren Roy – not part of my cohort but one of the invaluable sanity support members for VP – has a new book out! Check out Grave Matters at your friendly neighborhood bookstore!
  • Shveta Thakrar wrote a very touching essay about what it was like to grow up feeling like a changeling: a child of non-European cultural background in small-town America. I just want to go back and give her teenaged self a hug!
  • Fonda Lee wrote a great short story involving irresponsible friends and 3D printers for Crossed Genres.
  • KJ Kabza has a piece in Beneath Ceaseless Skies. Issue 168 is not available on-line quite yet, but I’ll update the link when it is!
  • Ben Kinney wrote a couple nice blog posts, one involving flaming bears in Judaism, and one comparing Chosen One plots to the Power of Love plots.

Nice job, everyone! It is inspiring having friends doing so many nifty things!

Fun with Cyanotypes (aka Sun Prints)

I am subject to enthusiasms, especially when it comes to making things.

The most recent bee in my bonnet was making cyanotypes. Many people know them as sun prints: you get (or make) special paper, expose it to the sun masked with something interesting, and get a beautiful blue and white print.

blackberry_loop

This enthusiasm started with wedding research. I’m getting married in September, and a recently married cousin gave me a ridiculous stack of Martha Stewart wedding magazines. Although very pretty, they yielded surprisingly few ideas.

One idea that did appeal was cyanotype place cards, done up with ferns and whatnot.

I did a bit of research, and established that although pre-treated cyanotype paper ran roughly a buck per sheet, there were lots of great how-tos on-line explaining how to do it yourself.

I ordered the chemicals . . . and then we bought a house and moved and six months went by.

That may not sound like the proper course of an enthusiasm, but I’m not quite that obsessive.

Rob and I finally got around to mixing the chemicals up a couple weeks ago. There are two separate chemicals involved, green ferric ammonium citrate and potassium ferricyanide. Mixed separately with distilled water, they are fairly stable. Once combined, they become UV sensitive, and should be used to treat your paper or fabric reasonably promptly.

I’m not going to go into the details here – we followed the excellent how-to on instructables.

There are a bunch of other how-tos on line.

We used rice paper instead of watercolor paper. It took the solution beautifully, but was somewhat delicate when it came to rinsing the completed prints.

First we treated the paper, then dried it. Apparently you can do the prints on a wet medium, but that has complications.

We then locked the paper away in a light-safe box (cardboard box wrapped in a trash bag, stored in the basement) and waited for a sunny day.

That could have been a long wait in Washington in winter, but we got lucky.

We got a sunny two-hour slice, and made the most of it.

We started by printing a test strip that indicated that the best exposures would be between five and ten minutes, depending on the desired shade of blue.

Then it was off to the races!

We printed some ferns:

fern_printing

fern_washing

completed_fern

completed_ferns

We printed a couple photographs, printed out on transparencies:

plum_photo

We printed some blackberries:

blackberries

For the natural-object prints, it was important to pin the materials down with a piece of glass. Even so, you can clearly see where the leaves and stems were not pressed down firmly.

That could either be a bug or a feature, depending on your outlook. We chose to consider it a feature!

The hardest part was rinsing the prints. As mentioned above, we used rice paper, which has many advantages but is rather delicate when wet.

I rigged a wash basin with a laundry basket and a hand-held shower nozzle. It worked pretty well, although if we left prints in too long they formed some signs of wear.

The whole thing was a blast, and offers lots of options for further fun.

You can print on fabric as well as paper, and it is color-fast (although you have to be careful about what detergent you use).

There is a great book on the subject:

Blueprints on Fabric by Barbara Hewitt

My enthusiasm has temporarily run its course, although this summer I’ll probably do some fabric.

I would recommend cyanotypes to any craft-minded person. It would be great fun with kids, too!

 

Terrible Things Happen – Should We Write Them?

This week’s shooting of three young Muslims in Chapel Hill got me thinking about just how many terrible things happen in the world, and the degree to which that should – or should not – be included in a work of fiction.

So far 2015 has seen mass killings; people killed or brutalized by police; people killed or brutalized by terrorists and extremists; and the standard run of murder and assault. And those are just the headline-worthy woes. If you get into the weeds of day-to-day prejudice and violence . . . well, why get out of bed in the morning?

I don’t think I’m the only one who finds it soul-crushing.

And yet it is happening, it is real, and ignoring it does not seem to be the answer.

 

Should We Include Such Things in Fiction?

I have mixed feelings on this.

Depicting hate-driven violence can help acknowledge that it is a real problem in our society. Such depictions can also be sickening and pointless. Of course, that is part of the point, but if I had run across the Chapel Hill shooting in a work of fiction – three nice young Muslims, two of them newly wed, gunned down by a hate-filled white atheist – I would have wondered why the author had chosen to include such a pointless horror.

However, we live in a world where such things are, horribly, a reality, and completely ignoring them does not seem to be the answer.

 

What to Include and in What Degree?

In a way “should we include it” boils down to two separate questions. What should we include, and how much of it should we include?

For example, if a work depicts prejudice, is it going to focus on the subtle day-to-day prejudice that is so insidious, or is it going to depict an all-out hate attack?

I think the “what” depends somewhat on the type of story, but humans being humans there is almost always some sort of prejudice available for consideration. I think it is a valuable thing to address in some form, whether it is class-based, age-based, race-based, gender-based, or something else. Really, “what” to include comes down to thinking through the dominant groups in a work, and how they would rub along together.

The “how much” can be a little trickier, and is likely to be more dependent on the type of story. If a religious war is central to the plot, then terrorist attacks are perfectly appropriate.

In a character-driven story where prejudice is a background element, rather than a major part of the plot, I think that keeping it to a background noise level is appropriate. It still acknowledges the problem. And really, that is the degree of problem that can realistically be addressed.

I think the truly horrific attacks grow out of the fertile soil provided by general prejudice. If the general prejudice were not there, these attacks might not occur, or might manifest in a different way.

I think it is very important to acknowledge the existence of prejudice, and to consider the impact it has on various members of a story.

I don’t think that the prejudice ever needs to escalate for its inclusion to be valuable.

 

Back Handed Inclusion

Many of us are uncomfortable with discussions of prejudice. Racism, religious prejudice, sexism – they are all loaded.

One thing that science fiction and fantasy bring to the table is the ability to mirror our world at safe remove.

For example, I’ve always found it interesting when a work of sci fi replaced inter-human racism with xenophobia against aliens.

It is sad that we have to go to an alternate reality to have a proper discussion about our irrational fears and biases, but at least we can take advantage of that safe space!

 

Thoughts on the subject? Please comment!

Writing and Feedback

This last week I stiffened my spine and sent my YA fantasy book out to beta readers. It got me thinking about the problem of writers and feedback at different stages of the writing process, and different levels of experience.

Feedback is both important and pitfall-ridden.

There may be the occasional writer (Kafka?) who can write amazing stories with no feedback. Most of us need someone else to help figure out what’s working and what isn’t.

The sad irony is that the less experienced a writer is, the more important feedback can be – and the harder it can be to get.

 

The Problem of Feedback

Feedback is vital, but sadly there is no guarantee that it will be good or appropriate.

Bad or inappropriate feedback can be extremely destructive, especially to a beginning writer who doesn’t have much perspective.

My brother was hot to write after college. He made a good go at it, writing daily and treating it as a job. He got the draft of a fantasy novel together, and handed it out to friends and family for feedback.

Among others, he gave the novel to our high school English teacher – a teacher who had done an excellent job of teaching us to analyze literary works. She also happened to favor literary fiction.

She . . . was not impressed.

Fair enough.

The problem was that my brother valued her opinion very highly, and the way she stated the problem was not “you need lots of practice” or anything more concrete; it was “you need to experience life before you try to write.”

It is true that life experience helps in writing, but unfortunately the teacher’s feedback caused my brother to simply stop writing.

Many very successful authors wind up trunking their first four or five or eight novels. Had my brother kept going, he might well be published long since.

The thing that I find most striking about this is that the feedback was given with the earnest desire to be helpful. And it stopped my brother cold.

How destructive, then, is malicious feedback? Wrongheaded feedback? Feedback that is trying to convert a story from one species to another?

This is all marginally less problematic for a more experienced writer with more perspective, but from all I’ve heard, the doubts never go away completely.

So, what to do?

 

Safe Feedback

There are a lot of potential sources of feedback out there. They vary significantly in risk.

I think that a beginning writer – or an especially insecure writer – should stick with the safest of these.

Indirect Feedback

Bad direct feedback can be extremely destructive.

Fortunately there are ways to get information about writing and editing that don’t involve exposing your precious work to the withering scorn of others.

The most effective of these is to let someone else expose themselves instead, and then look for useful information in the feedback.

The “Share Your Work” forum on AbsoluteWrite is a great place to do that.

You do have to be signed up officially, but aside from that you can hop on immediately.

Hopeful writers will post chunks of work, usually first chapters or short stories.

Anyone on the forum who is interested can then comment.

Some of the comments are impressions, some are line edits. Some are excellent, some are largely useless.

These critiques provide three valuable things:

  • Information on mistakes that you may well have in your own work.
  • A view into the range of opinion – there are often completely contradictory pieces of feedback.
  • A way to improve your “eye” – and then apply it to your own work.

It is a fine crash course in basic editing, and it provides no risk to the observer.

Safe Feedback

The ideal is to get feedback from a known safe source – someone who will give useful information, and isn’t at risk of crushing you.

This is the ideal. I don’t know how you could find such a source without risk – but if you have a source of safe and effective feedback, value it!

Usually the best you can do is to get feedback in a safe environment. When I attended Viable Paradise, they made it very clear that the critiques should be honest but gentle. If you are considering a workshop or course, try to find out about the flavor of the critiques.

There are some groups that seem to pride themselves on being harsh – apparently equating quality with toughness, and toughness with brutality.

Avoid these!

Write Write Write!

The last safe approach – the one I used for the first couple years – was to simply write. A lot.

Although guided and conscious practice is ideal, any practice is good.

There are many ways to improve the efficacy, including looking at books on writing and editing. I found “Self Editing for Fiction Writers” especially helpful, since it gave concrete examples out of well-known fiction.

Dangerous but Potentially Effective

There are many sources of feedback that can be risky but may have a significant payoff in terms of helpful information. In seeking these out, honestly consider how thick your skin is and how committed you are.

If they say you stink in the harshest way possible, will you be able to keep going?

If so, go for it!

Writing Groups

Many of my fellow students at Viable Paradise had had excellent experiences with writing groups. If you can find a group of like-minded writers, it can be a good source of feedback, while also giving you the benefit of thinking critically about other writers’ work.

There are three major potential problems with a writing group:

  • You’re all beginning writers. This doesn’t render it useless – chances are that you’re all rabid readers, which means you’ll have at least some useful opinions on each others’ work. However, you won’t come along as quickly as if you have a more experienced source of advice. It is a somewhat bigger problem if you are intermediate or advanced, and everyone else is beginning. Then you’re at risk of becoming the teacher. Gratifying, but not as helpful to you.
  • They’re mean. Usually it isn’t everyone who is mean, but all it takes is one brutal person.
  • They don’t read your kind of stories. Writing is writing up to a point, but if you write fantasy and your writing group is made up of literary fiction writers – or vice versa – you won’t be able to effectively evaluate the quality of the story, or give good advice.

Beta Readers

This is where I am!

The risk level varies quite a bit. I minimized it by drawing many of my beta readers from my Viable Paradise cohort – so I know that they at least have some background in kind but useful critiques. I also supplied the first couple chapters to help verify that they were a good match with the story. I want to make my story the best it can be – not change what kind of story it is. So it helps if they like the type of story it is!

So. Fellow writers – good, especially if you have some sense of their likely style.

Friends. Well . . . risky.

It helps if you know they like the type of story you wrote. Even then, think through what will happen if they never give you feedback, or if they give you terrible feedback.

I gave my first completed/edited (now trunk) novel to my then-boyfriend to beta.

He never told me what he thought. I suspect he only got a few chapters in.

It probably wasn’t very good – it’s a trunk novel now – but that silence was almost as damaging as a brutal critique. Maybe more so, since it just left me hanging.

It isn’t a coincidence that I stopped writing for a year or two.

Fortunately I moved on!

Workshops/Conferences/Etc.

My critique experiences at Viable Paradise were very helpful.

Depending on the workshop, it can be a very beneficial experience.

Just do your homework. Most workshops – standalone or associated with a conference – have been around for a while, and will have a known personality.

The participants vary from year to year, so it is always possible a bad egg will sneak in, but this is a comparatively safe resource since there is usually some sort of moderator.

Online Critiques

After you’ve gotten indirect feedback for a while by observing or providing critiques online, you can give it a whirl yourself.

There are a number of online critique forums, including AbsoluteWrite and Critters.

The biggest risk with these is that someone can be brutal – it’s somewhat luck of the draw – but they are usually somewhat regulated, and try to promote playing nicely.

I had very good luck when I submitted things to AbsoluteWrite. I would recommend it – but it is likely to be most helpful once you have the fundamentals down and are trying to refine your craft.

 

Actually, that goes for pretty much all of these except the indirect feedback method.

 

Other Opinions?

These thoughts on feedback and where to get it are drawn from my own experience, direct and otherwise.

Thoughts or opinions? Please share!